[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 9]
[House]
[Pages 12012-12014]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM

  (Mr. CANTOR asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. CANTOR. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland, the 
majority leader, for the purpose of announcing next week's schedule.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  On Monday, the House will meet in pro forma session at 2 p.m. On 
Tuesday, the House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for morning-hour debate and 
2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes postponed until 6:30. On 
Wednesday and Thursday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for legislative 
business. On Friday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative 
business.
  We will consider several bills under suspension of the rules. A 
complete list of those bills will be provided by the end of business 
tomorrow.
  In addition, we will consider H.R. 2187, the 21st Century Green High-
Performing Public Schools Facilities Act; H.R. 2101, the Weapons 
Acquisition Systems Reform Through Enhancing Technical Knowledge and 
Oversight Act; and the fiscal 2009 war supplemental appropriations 
bill.
  Mr. CANTOR. I would ask the gentleman what days he would think that 
the measures he discussed would come to the floor next week.
  Mr. HOYER. I think that the 21st Century Green High-Performing Public 
Schools Facility Act will probably be on the floor on Wednesday. The 
weapons acquisition system and supplemental, I would expect the 
supplemental on Thursday or Friday, depending upon how our business 
proceeds.
  Mr. CANTOR. Mr. Speaker, as the gentleman has discussed next week's 
schedule, I would like to ask the gentleman if he could give the House 
and the public a sense of what to expect for the following week as 
well.
  Mr. HOYER. Well, we have a number of pieces of legislation. We have 
done a lot over this work period. We did the National Water Research 
Development and Initiative Act, credit card legislation, hate crimes, 
budget conference report, Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending 
Act, which we passed, and the Fight Fraud Act, which we passed 
yesterday, and we did the predatory lending.
  In addition to the items that I already mentioned for next week, we 
will be keeping, obviously, in touch with the Senate as to what they 
are passing. We get a number of these items at conference before we 
have a break on Memorial Day. We hope that will happen as well.
  But we have a number of items that will be pending.
  I hope to be able to move the D.C. vote bill, we are working on that, 
before the Memorial Day break, and we will see what the committees are 
able to report out in the coming week that we can put on the floor the 
last week.
  Mr. CANTOR. I would ask the gentleman to follow up on the prospect of 
a vote on the D.C. bill and ask whether he could assure the Members on, 
frankly, both sides of the aisle who are concerned about the Second 
Amendment, whether there will be the necessary protections for the 
Second Amendment rights in that measure.
  Mr. HOYER. I think all of us are concerned about the Second 
Amendment. I hope all of us are also concerned about 600,000 citizens 
in the United States of America who have a Representative in this House 
who can't vote. Unfortunately, too many people, in my view, voted 
against that bill.

[[Page 12013]]

  So what we have now done is undermine the home rule rights of the 
District of Columbia, as well as preventing them from voting on this 
floor. I think that is very unfortunate.
  As the gentleman is well aware, there are, obviously, significant 
differences on the amendment that was offered in the Senate. We are 
going to be considering how we can try to get this bill through. 
Because the reality is, neither position might enjoy a majority in the 
final analysis, either in the Senate or perhaps here.
  So I am trying to figure out how we can give 600,000 of our 
citizens--an awful lot of us get up on this floor and we talked about 
how important it is, in the 1980s, behind the Iron Curtain, to get 
people free. We talk about, in Cuba, how it's important to get people 
free. We talk about how it's important, in some Middle East states, to 
give people a vote.
  But here, in the Nation's capital, the center of freedom and 
democracy, we do not have a representative. Unlike any other capital of 
any other democratic nation in the world, their representative cannot 
vote in this parliament.
  I think that's a tragedy. I think it's a diminishment of our 
democracy. And I will tell the gentleman that I would hope that this 
House would rise up as one voice saying this is not right, and we will 
pass the D.C. voting rights. We can deal with other issues that are 
very important, but it certainly seems to me that we ought to deal with 
that issue directly.
  Unfortunately, as you know, when Mr. Davis introduced that bill, a 
majority of your party, an overwhelming majority of your party, Mr. 
Davis being of your party, a leader in your party, did not support that 
bill.
  There is no doubt that the amendment that was added in the Senate 
complicates its consideration here, which is why it hasn't come to the 
floor a long time ago. But we are trying to figure it out.
  Mr. CANTOR. My question was not to get into the substance of the D.C. 
bill, but just to make sure that those of us who are ardent supporters 
of the Second Amendment rights would see that actually the citizens of 
the District of Columbia could enjoy those rights as well.
  Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman about the omission of the cap-
and-trade bill in his discussion for the schedule for the next several 
weeks. The reports have indicated that Chairman Waxman has now 
committed to bringing that bill that has been debated, at least, in 
subcommittee, forward, or at least beyond that subcommittee, to the 
full committee instead of the discussion in the subcommittee.
  It has given some of our Members some cause for alarm because, you 
know, this is a significant shift in policy. Some of us are very 
opposed to what this bill would do and have the consequences in mind of 
what this bill would do.
  If we look, Mr. Speaker, at Members on our side of the aisle who are 
on that subcommittee who would like to have a say in the crafting of 
any legislation, especially in the area of energy, somebody like John 
Shimkus who has a district that is very rich with coal, very, very 
concerning to him in terms of the economy and jobs. People like, on 
your side of the aisle, the gentleman from Louisiana, Charlie Melancon 
on that subcommittee, very interested in industry; Baron Hill of 
Indiana, who also has big concerns on the coal issue; Rick Boucher, 
from my own State of Virginia. Southwest Virginia is abundant with coal 
and natural resources. It would devastate that region if such a bill 
were to go forward.
  All of these Members, Mr. Speaker, do have a desire, I am sure, to be 
a part of the debate.
  I would ask, is it the leader's intention that this is a good move? 
He is the leader. And his chairmen, one of them has decided to move the 
bill beyond the subcommittee. Is that something he supports?
  And then is it the intention, I would ask of the leader, to bring the 
bill directly to the floor once, I assume, it passes the full 
committee?
  Mr. HOYER. First of all, I want to say to the gentleman, the reason 
it's not on the calendar for the next 2 weeks, it was never intended to 
be on the calendar over the next 2 weeks. The intention, as I have 
articulated all along, and the chairman's intention, was to have a 
target of marking up the bill in committee prior to the Memorial Day 
break. So there was never any intention that a bill would be on the 
floor prior to the Memorial Day break.
  Secondly, I would tell the gentleman, I don't know that the chairman 
has made a decision on whether to mark it up in subcommittee or mark it 
up in full committee.
  I do know that it's going to be marked up in committee and open to an 
amendment in committee, open to debate and open to a vote. Now, whether 
it's in subcommittee or full committee, that determination, as I 
understand it, has not been made. But it will be, certainly, marked up 
in committee and subject to full debate.
  Mr. CANTOR. Returning to next week's agenda, Mr. Speaker, for a 
moment, he mentions that the war supplemental will be coming to the 
floor, and it provides us with a chance, I know he agrees, to 
accomplish one of the most important things that we have to do here as 
a Member of Congress, which is to provide for the national defense of 
our country.
  And as the gentleman knows, many of us, most of us, if not all 
Republicans, stand with this President in support of his strategy in 
Afghanistan and the general region, and Pakistan, Iraq, and we stand 
with the President in his support of our troops there.
  I know that there have been, Mr. Speaker, some agreements on the 
gentleman's side of the aisle as far as the issues having to do with 
timetables, the issues of having to do with cutting off funding, of 
transfer of detainees from the Guantanamo Bay detention center 
facility.
  So I assume, and maybe it's an improper assumption, Mr. Speaker, and 
I would ask the gentleman if he could comment, if he believes that he 
will need the help and bipartisan support to pass this bill that we are 
interested on this side in helping pass for our troops, is it his 
intention that we will have an opportunity to address some of these 
concerns on the floor, specifically if he could tell us whether an 
amendment such as that proposed by Mr. Tiahrt from Kansas and the 
Appropriations Committee banning any further appropriations being 
allowed in the area of transferring detainees from the Guantanamo Bay 
facility?
  Mr. HOYER. The markup was just concluded. I have not reviewed the 
Tiahrt amendment, nor have I had discussions with the chairman 
regarding the rule and what amendments would be asked for or what 
amendments would be made in order.
  Very frankly, I will tell my friend, it's not the majority that needs 
your help in passing this bill; our troops need your help in passing 
this bill, our country needs your help. And I appreciate your comments 
that you support the President in his efforts in Afghanistan and 
Pakistan.

                              {time}  1600

  We are confronted with an extraordinarily difficult situation, 
destabilizing situation, dangerous situation, and this supplemental 
obviously is directed at making sure that our troops have the resources 
they need to pursue the objectives that we and the President have given 
to them. We look forward to having that bill passed with bipartisan 
support.
  Mr. CANTOR. I thank the gentleman. Mr. Speaker, I would say that, 
just to reiterate my point, my sense is--and I'm not the one that 
counts votes on his side of the aisle, but as a former whip, I know he 
knows that there is some difficulty, and it is my hunch that without 
the support of Republicans that the American people wouldn't see the 
money flow to their troops.
  But I'd like to at this time, Mr. Speaker, if I could, yield to my 
colleague from Illinois (Mr. Kirk).
  Mr. KIRK. The majority leader is correct: the committee just finished 
consideration of this legislation and the Tiahrt amendment. During our 
debate, Congressman Wolf highlighted

[[Page 12014]]

reports that he had received from law enforcement that three terrorists 
from the East Turkmenistan Islamist movement were scheduled to be 
released in McLean, Virginia, last Friday. But for his objection, that 
might have happened.
  And so it gave an urgency to the Tiahrt amendment, since former 
Chairman Wolf, now Ranking Member Wolf, had received this report from 
local law enforcement in his district and was concerned that things 
were moving much quicker than otherwise we would have thought.
  Mr. CANTOR. I thank the gentleman. Again, I would say to the majority 
leader, I think that that underscores the importance of a bipartisan 
effort here on this bill and, frankly, if he were to see coming forward 
a rule that would allow for us to have the disposition of these issues 
on the floor, I do believe the American people would be better served, 
and certainly our men and women in uniform.
  With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________